mats nilson photography

And THAT (extension tubes) is not surprising, since the only extension tubes made by Nikon date from prehistoric time when dinosaurs roamed the world! (God knows why anyone would need extension tubes for such large subjects, but anyway..) Pleeeeease let us have new ones!

I own both the 85PC and the 24PC-E, and on the D3, there's less hassle working with the PC-E, since it will close down the aperture automatically, but you already know that. I'm not quite sure whether that works with older cameras, though.. The only notable difference between 85PC and 85PC-E is the addition of 'Nano Coating' which should produce images with better contrast, but I've never found the 85PC wanting in that respect. I haven't tried the new 85, then, but the one I have is nothing short of brilliant. I certainly don't consider upgrading.

Old lenses can have sticky apertures if they haven't had too much exercise lately. Exept, that would produce the reverse

result. I had an old lens that did that, giving grossly overexposed images when I set a small aperture, since it wouldn't close

all the way. So that shouldn't be it.

 

Nor can it be the WB - both images seem to be the same in that respect.

 

Very puzzling..

I actually think those images are very nicely exposed! Anything that's not illuminated by strong monochromatic stage-lights seems quite

free from colour casts. Nice work! Those images give me an immediate sense of what it must be like in such a place. Taking away the red

wouldn't do that, I think. After all, coloured spots are part of the show!

 

However, if you want to do anything about it, you really do need to shoot RAW. Then you can forget about WB altogether, and save that

decision to post-processing. I do all my PP in Lightroom, and there it's quite possible to, e.g., lower saturation for reds only. But - those

faces will still be lit by a strong monochromatic red light, and if you want to achieve natural skin colour - rather than just desaturated reds -

you must resort to flash. Just more of it than you do now, and then anything not lit by flash will go dark. That's just physics.

The newest VR telephotos, the 400, 500 and 600, have a 'tripod mode' for their VR. It's there to counter mirror slap on a locked-down tripod

head. For shooting with, e.g., a Wimberley head, 'normal' VR mode is recommended. And it works! First thing I did after unpacking my 600

was to take a handheld shot just out through my office door at 1/80s with VR in normal - and it was pin sharp! (I realised that I'll need to

spend more time in the gym, though.. Heavy beast!)

In Sweden, the price difference isn't that big. The equivalent of 7830 USD for the Canon 500/4 and 8365 USD for the new Nikon VR. So

here the choice might be a bit easier. But regardless, whereas the lens is the most significant part when it comes to image quality, the

camera body is the part that takes most fiddling and feeling comfortable with. I believe I would have difficulties changing back and forth

between different bodies, let alone camera systems. Particularly when it comes to shooting action. That would be my main objection to

getting a Canon rig for just bird photography. And I definitely wouldn't want to change all my gear, since Canon just can't do what I want

from a camera system.

Heja Sverige, indeed! :-) Except, of course, right now it's rather depressing with the sun barely reaching above the

horizon, not that you see it anyway as steely gray clouds seem to have parked here for good..<br>

<br>

Anyway, I spoke to renowned Swedish photographer Staffan Widstrand, with tons of experience shooting in the high

Arctic, and he was much surprised to hear about my experience. He had never heard of anything like it, and he if

anyone ought to.<br>

<br>

I feel now that, although this happened outside of the warranty period, I will let Nikon know that I'm not at all satisfied

with something like this happening. There must have been a fault with that element. On the upside - chances are it

won't happen again, since it seems to be such a rare occurrence.<br>

<br>

If anyone has a similar experience to relate, I'd be interested in hearing of it. Otherwise, thank you all, you've given

me very valuable input.<br>

<br>

/Mats<br>

<br>

P.S

The Glögg mentioned by Alex is a great remedy after returning from a cold day. You should try it! <a

href>http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mulled_wine</a>

Please, S:t Nikon, let me have a 200mm f4G AF-S VR Macro for Christmas! Or maybe a 400mm f5.6G AF-S VR that I could sling over my

shoulder while walking my dog, just in case something turns up.

So I've heard, too, except that this wasn't a Canon but a Nikon, which don't have fluorite lenses in them.

 

So far this winter I've put out 80kg of sunflower seeds for my garden birds, but not had one single day of decent light since I got my new lens. But when the skies finally clear I will have the lens cold and on the ready! :-)

Yes, a defect such as internal stress springs to mind, but needless to say, this happened well outside the warranty

period. It wasn't the front-most element, but maybe the next - not so easy to tell. The protective front element would

surely have been cheaper to replace.. I immediately came to think of musicians who are very fussy about bringing their

instruments out in the cold, and thought similar precautions were inevitable, even for lenses.

 

It's good to hear that you haven't experienced such problems, Jim.

 

And no, Bob, I live in northernmost Sweden, but that amounts to just about the same. :-)

 

Oh, and just for the record, we're talking of an AF-S Nikkor 500/4 II, btw.

 

Thanks for your input so far! Car burglary is all but unheard of up here, so it sounds like a wise thing to do. Actually,

wrapping it and letting it spend the night on the balcony ought to do it. Then it would keep cold for quite some time, even

in the back of a warm car.

Aye, the cause is fairly obvious. And I suppose slowly acclimatising the lens would have put less immediate stress on the

lens element. It has never happened to any smaller diameter lenses - and I've put them trough some low temps as well - so

I guess it has to do maybe with an internal stress in such a large piece of glass. The solution seems to be to cool the lens

down slowly, but then one might as well forget about those spur-of-the-moment photo opportunities. :-(

A year or two ago, I went by a rapid in a nearby river, where a temperature of -32C (-26F) filled the air above the water with a mist that was

set ablaze with the rays of the rising sun. I took my camera and 500/4 lens out of the warm car and put it on a tripod and started shooting.

To this day, the sound of a large ED front element cracking keeps ringing in my ears..

 

Actually, although there is a clearly visible crack in the glass, the lens still performs well, and I haven't had the opportunity to do anything

about it before. Now, however, I've just received its replacement: a 600/4, and will have the 500 repaired and sold.

 

This time, I will NOT want to hear that sound again! So, folks, how do you go about taking pictures in the cold? I've searched the fora on

photo.net, but only come up with threads pertaining to condensation issues. There are zillions of pictures of Ice Bears, Penguins, and

whatnot out there, so obviously people do venture out regardless.

 

Any input is most welcome!

 

/Mats<div></div>

Oh, I got it through a retailer here in Sweden.

 

Not had time to take it through much testing yet, but as far as I can tell it's a super lens. Obviously, if you need a tilt/shift wide-angle it will

certainly do the job excellently (and it's not as if there's any competition around, is there?)! Among other things, I do a lot of forest interior

work and there this lens will help keep the tree trunks vertical, so to speak. One thing I noticed yesterday, is its great handling of contrasty

light. No discernible ghosting, as far as I can tell. I also do some architectural and studio photography, so I'm sure it'll find its uses. I'll just

have to be careful when switching lenses, not to let any dust or moisture in!

Ooops! Actually, when I focus the PC85 towards its closest focusing distance, I can see some of its inner machinery as

well. Maybe this is a necessity because of the tilt/shift. Anyway, it all seems like a construction to seriously collect dust!

I just got my PC-E 24/3.5 and something with it strikes me as peculiar. When I look into it from the lens mount, I can

see quite a lot of little gears and electronic contacts and stuff that one normally can't see in a lens. I have the PC

85/2.8, too, and there's nothing to be seen, except a matte black 'tube'. Now, obviously, due to its construction, one

might expect to find some odd features, but this? For one thing it means a lot of electronics are less than well-

protected, save from the rubber gasket at the lens-mount.

 

My question then: Is this the case for all of you (who own this lens) or is my lens missing something?

 

/Mats

Hi!

 

I travel to India now and then, and have found the following equipment quite useful. Mind you, I'm one of those grumpy old analog farts, so you'll have to convert to digital for yourself. Anyway, here's what I carry: F5 + 17-35/2.8 + 70-200/2.8 + TC14EII. If there's one thing I constantly find myself wanting, it's a tripod. It's as always a trade-off, someone's got to carry it..

 

Here's some of the <a href="http://www.matsnilson.com/indweb3/">result</a> from my last trip a month ago.

I don't own this lens, nor the non-VR 105/2.8. I don't know about VR. I have it in the 70-200/2.8 and there it works beautifully, but of course, close-up would be something else altogether. However, I do like the idea of AF-S. 1stly because of its speed, and 2ndly because it's that much less noisy.

 

The 200/4 Micro is an excellent lens, as far as I know, but for Nikon DSLRs, it does feel a bit too long IMO. Therefore, an improved 105 will be very useful. Better glass is always an improvement, for whatever reason - sharpness, chromatic aberration, etc..

 

What no one seems to reflect on, is the place of this new lens in Nikon's micro system. It's clearly meant for the DSLRs. And its non-rotating front element with a filter thread of 62mm rather than the old one's (rotating?) 52mm, is a killer in combination with the new macro flash system!

 

Put this lens on a D2X, add the SB-R1C1, and what else can you possibly ask for?

Oh yes, and I should have said: I alerted them to the problems, I don't know how many times, but to no avail.

Allright, so everybody agrees it isn't the world's best photography magazine. Me too, definitely. But that you can easily find out by looking through a few copies. However, my biggest complaint is that they are terribly sloppy when it comes to handling subscriptions. <I>Twice</I> have they managed to loose track of my payment, trying to make me pay again. And overseas addresses seem to be too complicated for them. One year they sent every issue to <I>Senegal</I> (Western Africa) instead of <I>Sweden</I> (Northern Europe) where I live. The poor people at the Senegal postal services had to find out where the hell my town, Sorsele, was. Not in Senegal obviously. Another year my subscription went to Sweden, Texas - if there's such a place. So guess if I got fed up eventually...!

Buying things isn't the big problem, the way I see it; either you have the money or you don't, and that goes whether you're married or not. I found being married was a financially better situation than being single. However, there's this thing about time. Time to spend on your own. When you're single, you can let everything else just wait if there suddenly is a great photo opportunity! Or you can step out of bed at three in the morning and there's no-one to tell you that you are behaving strangely! Or you can stop the car in the middle of nowhere and spend hours exploring whatever caught your eye, without having a bored family waiting in the car... But then again, maybe you, like most here at photo.net, are mainly a camera collector with little interest in actually taking pictures. In that case, mary a rich woman and continue shopping to your heart's delight! :-)

Hmmm. Some of you guys think you are really smart don't you? Well, whereas the air in the tube obviously has got nothing to do with the quality - parallellity between front and rear has! And I suspect tolerances to be more precise in brand specific and more expensive tubes. If front and end aren't exactly parallell, your plane of focus will be tilted, which, admittedly, just might be used to your advantage. But there are better ways for that.

I'm not very familiar with different Cessna models, but the one I've used worked nicely. Here's a tip: The window on the left side of the plane doesn't open up completely UNLESS you unscrew a stopper. Having done that, be VERY careful when you open it lest it bang a hole through the wing as it is forced open by the slipstream. Only open it when your air velocity comes down to something like 40 knots. Oh, and one more thing, there is a rather good book on aerial photography "Secrets of Successful Aerial Photography" by Richard Eller (ISBN 1-58428-018-2) that I think you should consider buying.

I've never been anywhere near that place, but I think Alex Lofquist is on to something. However, personally I'd exclude the surfers and make telephoto images of the surf itself. I've seen such pictures and they appeal to me. Huge translucent green waves breaking - that sort of thing. But, it's your back, not mine... :-)

I don't mean to be rude or anything, but it sounds as if you have bought a terribly insufficient tripod combination. With such a flimsy set, you may just as well leave VR on, I think... Those weight ratings should not be taken too literally. I have an Arca-Swiss B1g which is rated for 90 kg on top of a surveillance tripod that easily supports as much, yet there are times when I could wish for even better support when shooting with long lenses. I think you should experiment to find out what works and what doesn't.

Just so you know: this is not just a problem with older cameras. I use my left eye (strange, because my right eye is dominant) which means that my nose is right on the focus area selector on my F5! I nearly always have to lock it for that reason, or else I'll never know when it may shift. I have thought of training the tip of my nose so that I could change focus point with it, but with very little success... :-)